Coons is simply smarter than O'Donnell in the Delaware Senate race. He may even be a better person and though Democrat more conservative in important ways!
O'Donnell comes off as more of a thug, despite her gender, when the heat is on.
Nonetheless, though I prefer Coons in the Senate, I wish that O'Donnell had done a better job representing the issue of constitutional separation of Church and State, in their most recent debate.
Coons stood by separation of Church and State. And that is alright, in the broad sense. If there is a state-sponsored religion, it might not be mine! And that would upset me! Right?
O'Donnell, for her part, challenged the separation concept slightly. She asked, correctly, "Where in the Constitution is sepation of church and state?"
The word "separation" is not there, but the concept is: "Congress shall make no law respecting," among other things, "an establishment of religion." That's "separation" enough for me.
But when I say, "I favor separation because I would not want a government-sponsored religion," I don't mean, and no one should mean, that the concept should govern all of reality in a simple-minded fashion from banning state-sponsored churches to controlling syllables falling from the mouths of government employees doing their work to prohibiting paper clips bent into the shape of an Muslim moon on a Department of Agriculture desk.
The First Amendment, and the Fourteenth Amendment (which probably intended to extend the First Amendment prohibitions to the States), WERE UNDOUBTEDLY NOT INTENDED TO MAKE "POLITICAL CORRECTNESS" THE PERSON-DAMNING, PERSON-DOOMING LAW OF THE LAND.
George Washington SIGNED the Constitution. He PRESIDED OVER the Consitutional Convention. He was our FIRST PRESIDENT.
How did he interpret the First Amendment Establishment of Religion Clause?
In his First Inaugural Adrerss, after he was elected President under the Constitution, he spent almost ONE-THIRD of the time talking about GOD.
Proof: My word counter says that the address is 1,433 words in length. 423 words are in the paragraphs about God. 423/1433 = 29.51%. See http://www.bartleby.com/124/pres13.html.
Suppose a Congressional Page had walked up to Washington and whispered in his ear, "Sir, you are misinterpreting the document which you just signed. When you said, in that document, by your signature beneath those words, 'Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion,' it means that all government officials may not even favorably speak of God while doing their work -- including you at this moment."
Which answer is George Washington most likely to have given?
(1) "Sir, you are mistaken. In fact, your words are so mistaken, I wonder if you are an insane man. Get off this podium, so that I can continue talking about that Almighty Being who rules over the universe, the benign Parent of the Human Race."
...or...
(2) "I'm sorry! I made a mistake!"
Showing posts with label Politics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Politics. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Not Encouraging: President Obama Dropped the Reference to God Out of His Reading of the Declaration of Independence
These is the exact wording of the Declaration of Independence:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
In a speech to the Congressional Spanish Caucus Institute on September 15, Obama spoke exactly as follows:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are crated equal. [Long Pause] Endowed with certain inalienable rights: life and liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”
You can see it here...
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/revisionist-recitation-obama-omits-creator-while-quoting-declaration/
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
In a speech to the Congressional Spanish Caucus Institute on September 15, Obama spoke exactly as follows:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are crated equal. [Long Pause] Endowed with certain inalienable rights: life and liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”
You can see it here...
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/revisionist-recitation-obama-omits-creator-while-quoting-declaration/
Saturday, September 18, 2010
Are Federal and State Political and Judicial Leaders Guilty of Conspiracy to Rape?
The title of this post is not a joke. It is a serious question.
Suppose I have a jail filled with reports of homosexual rape. Correctional officers hear screams in a cell, run to it, and there they see two thug inmates holding down an inmate while a third thug inmate shoves his X into the held-down inmate's Y and Z. Let's say that there are hundreds of cases of this every year in the jail, and report after report after report is filed, detailing witnessed homosexual rapes. A raw count verifies that one out of three inmates get it by force in the Y and Z.
Let's say that this goes on in jails across each state, in every state in the United States.
But no one ever fixes the problem, because fixing the problems of bad guys is politically unpopular.
Instead, the phenomenon is used by cops as a weapon of terror during arrest -- "I hope that you have some Vaseline with you, Fred, because you're going to need it, where you're going!" (I actually heard a sergeant-at-arms say that once in court to a newly-convicted defendant.) And Gary Sinise taunts fictionalized defendants with that line in "CSI New York."
In one of my cases, years ago, the defendant was this wonderful, innocent visitor from Somalia with no criminal record at all who was driving down Ridge Avenue in Philadelphia when a speeding car coming in from the right went through a red light and slammed into the Somali's car, spinning it around, and damaging the Somali's accelerator so that it was locked at the speed the Somali had been traveling. The Somali national screamed helplessly as his car, brakes smoking, sped into a crowd of churchgoers, injuring 6, including a man whose two legs had to be amputated. While the emotionally crushed, traumatized Somali jabbered at police in the Somali language, the white guy who really caused the accident calmly told police that HE had had the green light. African American police assumed that the white guy was telling the truth, did no search for witnesses, and had the Somali incarcerated, awaiting trial, under $50,000 bail. (I later found a group of 5 witnesses sitting on a local tavern's steps who saw the accident, who took bets that the innocent black guy got arrested.)
The Detention Center was overcrowded that day, so they put the Somali in Holmesburg Prison (still open, then) where he was held-down and forcibly raped again and again and again.
So, it happens. In this morning's Philadelphia Inquirer the editorial, headlined "Prison equals rape," discusses this problem. It notes that the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics estimated that 88,500 prisoners in federal and state prison were raped by homosexual inmates or guards in the last 12 months.
Suppose I run a nursing home that really is the last stop before the funeral home for 99% of the patients.
And suppose I, the owner, am fully aware that the place is a Bedlam of homosexual rape, ultimately for about one-third of the patients.
But I do NOTHING to solve the problem, but smilingly tease the new patients, after their families leave, with the words, "I hope you brought Vaseline, Joe!"
Aren't I GENUINELY guilty of the crime of Conspiracy to Rape, and shouldn't I GENUINELY go to prison for the rest of my life, if my actions (keeping the place open) and inaction (doing nothing to stop the rapes) causes helpless screaming patient after helpless screaming patient -- HUNDREDS -- to be relentlessly raped, again and again and again.
I have long believed that every judge who knowingly sentences inmates to such places, and every prosecutor who knowingly tries to put inmates in such places, and every governor and mayor and correctional officer who jokingly tolerates the problem, is guilty of Conspiracy to Rape, and should be tried, convicted, and imprisoned.
Suppose I have a jail filled with reports of homosexual rape. Correctional officers hear screams in a cell, run to it, and there they see two thug inmates holding down an inmate while a third thug inmate shoves his X into the held-down inmate's Y and Z. Let's say that there are hundreds of cases of this every year in the jail, and report after report after report is filed, detailing witnessed homosexual rapes. A raw count verifies that one out of three inmates get it by force in the Y and Z.
Let's say that this goes on in jails across each state, in every state in the United States.
But no one ever fixes the problem, because fixing the problems of bad guys is politically unpopular.
Instead, the phenomenon is used by cops as a weapon of terror during arrest -- "I hope that you have some Vaseline with you, Fred, because you're going to need it, where you're going!" (I actually heard a sergeant-at-arms say that once in court to a newly-convicted defendant.) And Gary Sinise taunts fictionalized defendants with that line in "CSI New York."
In one of my cases, years ago, the defendant was this wonderful, innocent visitor from Somalia with no criminal record at all who was driving down Ridge Avenue in Philadelphia when a speeding car coming in from the right went through a red light and slammed into the Somali's car, spinning it around, and damaging the Somali's accelerator so that it was locked at the speed the Somali had been traveling. The Somali national screamed helplessly as his car, brakes smoking, sped into a crowd of churchgoers, injuring 6, including a man whose two legs had to be amputated. While the emotionally crushed, traumatized Somali jabbered at police in the Somali language, the white guy who really caused the accident calmly told police that HE had had the green light. African American police assumed that the white guy was telling the truth, did no search for witnesses, and had the Somali incarcerated, awaiting trial, under $50,000 bail. (I later found a group of 5 witnesses sitting on a local tavern's steps who saw the accident, who took bets that the innocent black guy got arrested.)
The Detention Center was overcrowded that day, so they put the Somali in Holmesburg Prison (still open, then) where he was held-down and forcibly raped again and again and again.
So, it happens. In this morning's Philadelphia Inquirer the editorial, headlined "Prison equals rape," discusses this problem. It notes that the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics estimated that 88,500 prisoners in federal and state prison were raped by homosexual inmates or guards in the last 12 months.
Suppose I run a nursing home that really is the last stop before the funeral home for 99% of the patients.
And suppose I, the owner, am fully aware that the place is a Bedlam of homosexual rape, ultimately for about one-third of the patients.
But I do NOTHING to solve the problem, but smilingly tease the new patients, after their families leave, with the words, "I hope you brought Vaseline, Joe!"
Aren't I GENUINELY guilty of the crime of Conspiracy to Rape, and shouldn't I GENUINELY go to prison for the rest of my life, if my actions (keeping the place open) and inaction (doing nothing to stop the rapes) causes helpless screaming patient after helpless screaming patient -- HUNDREDS -- to be relentlessly raped, again and again and again.
I have long believed that every judge who knowingly sentences inmates to such places, and every prosecutor who knowingly tries to put inmates in such places, and every governor and mayor and correctional officer who jokingly tolerates the problem, is guilty of Conspiracy to Rape, and should be tried, convicted, and imprisoned.
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Philadelphia About to Tax Blogs Structured to Be Profit-Making
I'm over in Jersey. But, the news out of Philadelphia is significant to all.
If one has a blog structured for profit-making, it must be registered with the City, and pay a $50 annual fee, or a lifetime fee of $300.
The implications are larger.
(1) Even if the blog earns $0.01, it must pay the $50 annually. This will tend to suffocate start-ups.
(2) Registering also subjects the blogs' income to a requirement that the $0.01 blog income be reported on
(2a) a Philadelphia wage tax return;
(2b) a state income tax return;
(2c) a federal 1040 return.
Since blog income must be added to other income, taxability threshholds will not apply to people with other income.
So, let's add-up the tax rates...
(Philadelphia Wage Tax rate 3.93%) + (Pennsylvania Income Tax rate 3.07%) + (modal functional threshhold Federal Income Tax rate 15%) = ~22%.
Ignoring any federal deduction for state and local taxes paid, since the deduction must be amortized over all income, not just the blog, and since it is a deduction, not a credit, the result of going after the blog income, including First-Amendment-protected blogs, is...
(1) The blog must earn more than $64 to net any money at all. Up to the first $64, the blog operates at a loss. One has to PAY to express one's views in a for-profit blog.
(2) On $100 of gross blog income, the net income = $100 - $50 - $22 = $28. So, the functional tax on $100 is 72%.
(3) On $200 of gross blog income, the net income = $200 - $50 - $44 = $106. So, the functional tax on $200 is a little less than 50%.
(3) On $400 of gross blog income, the net income = $400 - $50 - $88 = $28. So, the functional tax on $400 is 34.5%.
So, new blogs have to earn about $400 in income a year before government revenue stops engaging in confiscatory levels of income seizure.
In an article the other day, the Philadelphia Inquirer soft-pedaled the "hit." The truth is that it's a roundhouse right for beginner blogs.
If one has a blog structured for profit-making, it must be registered with the City, and pay a $50 annual fee, or a lifetime fee of $300.
The implications are larger.
(1) Even if the blog earns $0.01, it must pay the $50 annually. This will tend to suffocate start-ups.
(2) Registering also subjects the blogs' income to a requirement that the $0.01 blog income be reported on
(2a) a Philadelphia wage tax return;
(2b) a state income tax return;
(2c) a federal 1040 return.
Since blog income must be added to other income, taxability threshholds will not apply to people with other income.
So, let's add-up the tax rates...
(Philadelphia Wage Tax rate 3.93%) + (Pennsylvania Income Tax rate 3.07%) + (modal functional threshhold Federal Income Tax rate 15%) = ~22%.
Ignoring any federal deduction for state and local taxes paid, since the deduction must be amortized over all income, not just the blog, and since it is a deduction, not a credit, the result of going after the blog income, including First-Amendment-protected blogs, is...
(1) The blog must earn more than $64 to net any money at all. Up to the first $64, the blog operates at a loss. One has to PAY to express one's views in a for-profit blog.
(2) On $100 of gross blog income, the net income = $100 - $50 - $22 = $28. So, the functional tax on $100 is 72%.
(3) On $200 of gross blog income, the net income = $200 - $50 - $44 = $106. So, the functional tax on $200 is a little less than 50%.
(3) On $400 of gross blog income, the net income = $400 - $50 - $88 = $28. So, the functional tax on $400 is 34.5%.
So, new blogs have to earn about $400 in income a year before government revenue stops engaging in confiscatory levels of income seizure.
In an article the other day, the Philadelphia Inquirer soft-pedaled the "hit." The truth is that it's a roundhouse right for beginner blogs.
Monday, August 9, 2010
Was Hiroshima "Without Warning"?
An article recently published in a Catholic periodical alleges that America dropped The Bomb on Hiroshima "without any prior warning whatsoever, so as to ensure the highest possible number of casualties." See
http://www.spiritdaily.com/timestemplate.htm
This is not quite true.
The Potsdam Ultimatum to the Japanese, as to which the Japanese formally responded with one word -- "Mokusatsu," or "Ignored" -- warned only of "prompt and utter destruction" -- not "prompt and utter destruction by a newly-developed weapon of immense power."
The main reason for this was fear of a dud, and of having to face the consequences of it being a dud.
Contrary to popular opinion, the bomb dropped on Hiroshima was a crude but completely untested Uranium device. The Trinity Test in the American Southwest in the months before the Hiroshima blast involved an absurdly-complex failure-prone Plutonium bomb. The Nagasaki bomb was of that variety. The failure-prone "fat man" design for Plutonium bombs was regarded as less reliable than the simple-but-fabulously-expensive "little boy" gun trigger design originally employed in Uranium 235 bombs -- the Hiroshima bomb. So, though untested, we used the "little boy" gun trigger design Uranium 235 bomb design first.
Though it as regarded as much more reliable, because it was untested the fear among Los Alamos scientists, the military, the President's cabinet and President Truman himself was that if the dropping of the bomb were announced in advance, it would draw major fighter resistance; and even if the bomber got through, if all it did is fall to the ground and splatter some mud the Japanese would be encouraged to fight, fight, fight, fight, fight on, endlessly, hoping for more duds.
In other words, there was a feeling that more American AND Japanese lives would be saved if an initial unannounced succesful bombing shocked the Japanese terribly, than if an initial announced successful bombing or an especially an announced unsuccessful bombing occurred.
Proof that the American government had limiting losses of Japanese civilians in mind, too, is the giant leaflet drops made by American bombers before and after the Hiroshima bombing.
Before the bombing of Hiroshima, on August 1, 1945 American bombers dropped leaflets asking the Japanese to please leave Hiroshima and other cities because they faced imminent destruction from bombing, which the picture inferred would be utterly massive...
https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol46no3/graphics/Graphic4front.jpg
No one is reported to have left the cities.
The government reviewed the warnings, and pooh-poohed them.
After the destruction of Hiroshima, we warned the Japanese people in another mass leaflet drop that we were in a position to destroy more cities in the same fashion, and begged them to please demand that the war end.
http://www.trumanlibrary.org/whistlestop/study_collections/bomb/large/documents/index.php?documentdate=1945-08-06&documentid=6-1&studycollectionid=abomb&pagenumber=1
Read that leaflet. Determine for yourself if that is an effort to "to ensure the highest possible number of casualties."
It's not.
The article writer who accused the United States of that was irresponsible.
Even despite the successful Hiroshima blast, and even despite careful consideration of the leaflets, the Japanese government was so intent on conquest and on continuing mass murder in Asia that they decided to gamble that we had no more atomic bombs remaining.
They were wrong.
Nagasaki was destroyed next.
Finally, the Japanese murder machine, which produced results like this...
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.nanking-massacre.com/content_images/nanking_massacre_11911575.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.nanking-massacre.com/Nanking_Massacre_Photo_Group_One.html&usg=__T6gBAMHJuaqhQnJXIgloFwuEnl8=&h=681&w=1036&sz=59&hl=en&start=0&tbnid=ojHaYeo_UxXAeM:&tbnh=138&tbnw=200&prev=/images%3Fq%3DNanking%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG%26biw%3D1020%26bih%3D572%26gbv%3D2%26tbs%3Disch:1&itbs=1&iact=rc&dur=500&ei=lh9gTKu4NcP68AbjhpW0DQ&oei=lh9gTKu4NcP68AbjhpW0DQ&esq=1&page=1&ndsp=15&ved=1t:429,r:0,s:0&tx=136&ty=117
...and like this...
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://listverse.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/nanking-massacre-rape-of-nanking-killing-children.jpg&imgrefurl=http://erud-awakening.blogspot.com/2009/09/righteous-nazi.html&usg=__ioGCmxI-xWNXhrufFk6IHBQWM-k=&h=421&w=685&sz=74&hl=en&start=0&tbnid=NqAR9jso8mjvFM:&tbnh=144&tbnw=206&prev=/images%3Fq%3DNanking%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG%26biw%3D1020%26bih%3D572%26gbv%3D2%26tbs%3Disch:1&itbs=1&iact=hc&vpx=390&vpy=239&dur=2671&hovh=176&hovw=287&tx=152&ty=87&ei=lh9gTKu4NcP68AbjhpW0DQ&oei=lh9gTKu4NcP68AbjhpW0DQ&esq=1&page=1&ndsp=15&ved=1t:429,r:7,s:0
...surrendered.
We did it right, in a way God would have approved of.
http://www.spiritdaily.com/timestemplate.htm
This is not quite true.
The Potsdam Ultimatum to the Japanese, as to which the Japanese formally responded with one word -- "Mokusatsu," or "Ignored" -- warned only of "prompt and utter destruction" -- not "prompt and utter destruction by a newly-developed weapon of immense power."
The main reason for this was fear of a dud, and of having to face the consequences of it being a dud.
Contrary to popular opinion, the bomb dropped on Hiroshima was a crude but completely untested Uranium device. The Trinity Test in the American Southwest in the months before the Hiroshima blast involved an absurdly-complex failure-prone Plutonium bomb. The Nagasaki bomb was of that variety. The failure-prone "fat man" design for Plutonium bombs was regarded as less reliable than the simple-but-fabulously-expensive "little boy" gun trigger design originally employed in Uranium 235 bombs -- the Hiroshima bomb. So, though untested, we used the "little boy" gun trigger design Uranium 235 bomb design first.
Though it as regarded as much more reliable, because it was untested the fear among Los Alamos scientists, the military, the President's cabinet and President Truman himself was that if the dropping of the bomb were announced in advance, it would draw major fighter resistance; and even if the bomber got through, if all it did is fall to the ground and splatter some mud the Japanese would be encouraged to fight, fight, fight, fight, fight on, endlessly, hoping for more duds.
In other words, there was a feeling that more American AND Japanese lives would be saved if an initial unannounced succesful bombing shocked the Japanese terribly, than if an initial announced successful bombing or an especially an announced unsuccessful bombing occurred.
Proof that the American government had limiting losses of Japanese civilians in mind, too, is the giant leaflet drops made by American bombers before and after the Hiroshima bombing.
Before the bombing of Hiroshima, on August 1, 1945 American bombers dropped leaflets asking the Japanese to please leave Hiroshima and other cities because they faced imminent destruction from bombing, which the picture inferred would be utterly massive...
https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol46no3/graphics/Graphic4front.jpg
No one is reported to have left the cities.
The government reviewed the warnings, and pooh-poohed them.
After the destruction of Hiroshima, we warned the Japanese people in another mass leaflet drop that we were in a position to destroy more cities in the same fashion, and begged them to please demand that the war end.
http://www.trumanlibrary.org/whistlestop/study_collections/bomb/large/documents/index.php?documentdate=1945-08-06&documentid=6-1&studycollectionid=abomb&pagenumber=1
Read that leaflet. Determine for yourself if that is an effort to "to ensure the highest possible number of casualties."
It's not.
The article writer who accused the United States of that was irresponsible.
Even despite the successful Hiroshima blast, and even despite careful consideration of the leaflets, the Japanese government was so intent on conquest and on continuing mass murder in Asia that they decided to gamble that we had no more atomic bombs remaining.
They were wrong.
Nagasaki was destroyed next.
Finally, the Japanese murder machine, which produced results like this...
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.nanking-massacre.com/content_images/nanking_massacre_11911575.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.nanking-massacre.com/Nanking_Massacre_Photo_Group_One.html&usg=__T6gBAMHJuaqhQnJXIgloFwuEnl8=&h=681&w=1036&sz=59&hl=en&start=0&tbnid=ojHaYeo_UxXAeM:&tbnh=138&tbnw=200&prev=/images%3Fq%3DNanking%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG%26biw%3D1020%26bih%3D572%26gbv%3D2%26tbs%3Disch:1&itbs=1&iact=rc&dur=500&ei=lh9gTKu4NcP68AbjhpW0DQ&oei=lh9gTKu4NcP68AbjhpW0DQ&esq=1&page=1&ndsp=15&ved=1t:429,r:0,s:0&tx=136&ty=117
...and like this...
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://listverse.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/nanking-massacre-rape-of-nanking-killing-children.jpg&imgrefurl=http://erud-awakening.blogspot.com/2009/09/righteous-nazi.html&usg=__ioGCmxI-xWNXhrufFk6IHBQWM-k=&h=421&w=685&sz=74&hl=en&start=0&tbnid=NqAR9jso8mjvFM:&tbnh=144&tbnw=206&prev=/images%3Fq%3DNanking%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG%26biw%3D1020%26bih%3D572%26gbv%3D2%26tbs%3Disch:1&itbs=1&iact=hc&vpx=390&vpy=239&dur=2671&hovh=176&hovw=287&tx=152&ty=87&ei=lh9gTKu4NcP68AbjhpW0DQ&oei=lh9gTKu4NcP68AbjhpW0DQ&esq=1&page=1&ndsp=15&ved=1t:429,r:7,s:0
...surrendered.
We did it right, in a way God would have approved of.
Saturday, August 7, 2010
Islam?
Look at the above, and at this...
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2010/08/07/medical-charity-americans-killed-militants-remote-area-n-afghanistan/
...and then ask, "How unanimous are Islamic condemnations of the acts?"
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
The Boob Cases
Years ago, before "sexual predator" became Political Correctness Bad Guy Number One, I bumped into a series of cases connected with young men emigrating to America from the Punjab region northwest of Delhi, India.
In the first case, an unmarried young man who had recently emigrated from the Punjab to southern New Jersey was pumping gas on the midnight shift when a very pretty 18 year old girl in a snug-fitting tube top drove into the station around 2:00 a.m. for a tank of gas.
The young man was very lonely, and much impressed with her comely appearance.
The girl thought to herself, "What a pleasant guy!" and looked at him and smiled at him in an ordinary American way as she told him that she wanted "regular."
Instead, she got something a little more "high octane" -- the young man reached into her car window and began fondling her breasts through her tube top!
The girl freaked-out, screamed, and drove with wheels screeching out of the gas station, to the local police station, and filed charges for sexual assault.
Bail was set at $5,000. The gas station owner was a cousin, and so he posted bail. I was retained as the young man's attorney. When I sat down with him with my translator, a woman from the Indian embassy in Washington, I asked him, "What happened? Why did you do it?" He answered, "She looked at me."
I asked, "Okay, then what happened?"
He responded, "She looked at me," with a tone suggesting, "What's the matter. Don't you get it?"
I persisted, "No, no, what I mean is, What happened so that you felt entitled to reach into the window and grab this girl on the breasts?"
Suddenly the translator, who was a Punjabi emigrant who came to America with her parents as a child, said, "Oh! I think I understand! Let me speak to him in our language!"
They went back and forth for a few minutes in the Punjabi dialect. Occasionally the translator inserted American colloquialisms like, "You idiot!" which he understood, and he looked very sheepish in response as she continued with a scold in Punjabi.
The translator then explained, "I only know of this. I never experienced it, because I grew up here in America. Do Punjabi girls stare at you, when you see them in stores?"
I said, "Yes. It looks like they are flirting with me."
The translator explained, "What is happening is that where he comes from, the girls must always look down when speaking to a man, because looking him the eyes is a signal which says, 'I am interested in you, sexually.' The Punjabi girls stare like that at you, because for them being able to stare at the men without inviting sex is a novel thing. American girls look at men when they talk to them, because here just looking at a man in the eyes does not mean, 'I want to have sex with you.' These lonely young men from northwest India forget where they are. When a girl drives in and looks him in the eye and asks for gas, he thinks, "Va-va-voom! She's looking at me! She is interested in sex!"
I burst out laughing. When the matter came to court, I asked the judge for an opportunity to conference the matter in the judge's chambers with the prosecutor, the victim and her family, the translator, my client and myself, and the judge present.
My client, the young man, looked terrified, and his hands shook very badly during the conference. This reaction only reinforced the impression that he lacked criminal intent.
When I gently explained what had happened on the night in question, and the translator very eloquently substantiated my explanation, the judge and the prosecutor were swayed, and discussed the matter with the family outside our presence.
The family consented to a "Dismissal Without Prejudice." What that means is that the case remained open, and that charges from this case would be added to charges from any new case if he got in trouble again, and he would be prosecuted in both cases -- a reasonable response to the circumstances.
To drive the point home, the judge screamed at him -- and I mean screamed -- in open court in a crowded courtroom, while the Defendant, shaking, cried.
But, he survived.
The next case occurred in a town only a short distance "up the Pike." Similar circumstances. Gas jockey, pretty girl, midnight shift. But this guy held out for weeks before he concluded, "She is looking at me! She loves me!" and then "turned amorous." One night the girl, very pretty but mechanically adept, opened the hood of her car and bent over and used a heavy pair of channel locks to remove a part from her engine to show him how the engine worked better without it. He walked up behind her and leaned his front against her behind, and reached around and grabbed her chest. She freaked out and pushed him away and slammed him in the face with the steel channel locks, and a policeman who had seen him lean against her that way and her reaction arrested the injured young man for sexual assault.
When the same Punjabi translator came up from Washington, D.C. for the case, she was puzzled at a second case so very much like the first. Because the girl had left the young man with a deep permanent scar from his forehead across his eye to his cheek, when we explained that the girl had been accidentally giving him Punjabi "go signs" for weeks she forgave him and asked that the charges be dismissed.
The third case was the worst. The girl was very pretty, very personable, and -- thank God -- very understanding. But she was married to a policeman! And, she was eight months pregnant at the time of the incident!
The girl and her police officer husband lived next to the gas station. She regularly went into the gas station mini-mart, and purchased household needs -- bread and milk and such -- and engaged the young man, whose wife was still back in the Punjab, in pleasant conversation. She said, "I was much taken with that guy's innocence! He seemed like such a good man!" She was well-endowed and otherwise very beautiful before becoming pregnant. After she became pregnant, she was even more "well-endowed."
She flew home to her mother's house in the Midwest for her baby shower. On her return, her husband picked her up at the airport after he finished working the second shift in his town as a patrolman. When they arrived back at the house next to the gas station and mini-mart, the eight-months-pregnant wife walked over to the mini-mart for some OJ. As she smiled pleasantly at her Punjabi gas jockey friend behind the cash register, he was feeling particularly lonely that night. His libido finally gave way. He thought, "SHE LOOKS AT ME SO MUCH! SHE MUST LOVE ME!" As she turned to go home, he reached over the counter, grabbed her boobs from behind, pulled the shocked girl over the counter and began kissing her madly on the lips as she flailed wildly.
From the driveway her husband saw his pregnant wife's flailing legs, thought, "Wha-a-a-at!" and ran over to the store with his gun drawn. He exploded through the door, screaming, "YOU BASTARD! GET YOUR HANDS OFF MY WIFE!"
He pulled his wife away from the shocked Punjabi, punched him very hard in the face, threw him to the floor, sat on him, and shoved the barrel of his his .45 into his mouth while he called on his cell phone for back-up.
I invited the wife and her police officer husband to the arraignment hearing -- the hearing where the indictment is read to the accused. When the translator came up from the embassy in Washington, and she realized that it was another "boob case," despite the seriousness of the charge she burst out laughing. She said, "We are going to have to do something about this, Mr. Dawson!"
The prosecutor knew me well, understood why I invited the victim and her husband to the arraignment, and agreed to let me and the translator speak to them alone in an empty courtroom. When I went over the facts with the translator, she said, "You are right. This is another one of those cases." The husband "wanted blood," but he listened carefully, with his wife, as the translator explained how cultural differences led to the man being enticed by the woman. "When they come over here to this county," she said, "They work 16 hours a day and send money back home to their families. That's it. That's all there is to their lives. They have no time to learn about this country and its culture and the language. They stay 100% Punjabi. When you were kind enough to talk to him, you innocently looked him in the eyes as you talked to him, the way we all do in America, and by that means you accidentally behaved in a way that in his part of India means, 'I may be pregnant, but I may be interested in having sex with you!'" I added, "Listen, it really was just circumstances, and your husband's response, based on what he saw, was 100% appropriate! But it was all really just a cultural misunderstanding. It really was. When cultures mix, it's 'oil and water.' The mix doesn't work out, and generates bizarre results."
The wife, to her credit, understood and relented. Over her husband's objections, she agreed to a plea to a greatly reduced charge, 5 years probation, and a $5,000 fine.
After that, the embassy caused the Indian government to require émigrés from the suspect sections of India to sit through lectures on American culture and American sexuality, to control the problem -- in effect, "IF AMERICAN GIRLS LOOK AT YOU AND SMILE, IT DOESN'T MEAN, 'I WANT SEX.'"
I haven't heard of any more cases of this sort in our area.
In the first case, an unmarried young man who had recently emigrated from the Punjab to southern New Jersey was pumping gas on the midnight shift when a very pretty 18 year old girl in a snug-fitting tube top drove into the station around 2:00 a.m. for a tank of gas.
The young man was very lonely, and much impressed with her comely appearance.
The girl thought to herself, "What a pleasant guy!" and looked at him and smiled at him in an ordinary American way as she told him that she wanted "regular."
Instead, she got something a little more "high octane" -- the young man reached into her car window and began fondling her breasts through her tube top!
The girl freaked-out, screamed, and drove with wheels screeching out of the gas station, to the local police station, and filed charges for sexual assault.
Bail was set at $5,000. The gas station owner was a cousin, and so he posted bail. I was retained as the young man's attorney. When I sat down with him with my translator, a woman from the Indian embassy in Washington, I asked him, "What happened? Why did you do it?" He answered, "She looked at me."
I asked, "Okay, then what happened?"
He responded, "She looked at me," with a tone suggesting, "What's the matter. Don't you get it?"
I persisted, "No, no, what I mean is, What happened so that you felt entitled to reach into the window and grab this girl on the breasts?"
Suddenly the translator, who was a Punjabi emigrant who came to America with her parents as a child, said, "Oh! I think I understand! Let me speak to him in our language!"
They went back and forth for a few minutes in the Punjabi dialect. Occasionally the translator inserted American colloquialisms like, "You idiot!" which he understood, and he looked very sheepish in response as she continued with a scold in Punjabi.
The translator then explained, "I only know of this. I never experienced it, because I grew up here in America. Do Punjabi girls stare at you, when you see them in stores?"
I said, "Yes. It looks like they are flirting with me."
The translator explained, "What is happening is that where he comes from, the girls must always look down when speaking to a man, because looking him the eyes is a signal which says, 'I am interested in you, sexually.' The Punjabi girls stare like that at you, because for them being able to stare at the men without inviting sex is a novel thing. American girls look at men when they talk to them, because here just looking at a man in the eyes does not mean, 'I want to have sex with you.' These lonely young men from northwest India forget where they are. When a girl drives in and looks him in the eye and asks for gas, he thinks, "Va-va-voom! She's looking at me! She is interested in sex!"
I burst out laughing. When the matter came to court, I asked the judge for an opportunity to conference the matter in the judge's chambers with the prosecutor, the victim and her family, the translator, my client and myself, and the judge present.
My client, the young man, looked terrified, and his hands shook very badly during the conference. This reaction only reinforced the impression that he lacked criminal intent.
When I gently explained what had happened on the night in question, and the translator very eloquently substantiated my explanation, the judge and the prosecutor were swayed, and discussed the matter with the family outside our presence.
The family consented to a "Dismissal Without Prejudice." What that means is that the case remained open, and that charges from this case would be added to charges from any new case if he got in trouble again, and he would be prosecuted in both cases -- a reasonable response to the circumstances.
To drive the point home, the judge screamed at him -- and I mean screamed -- in open court in a crowded courtroom, while the Defendant, shaking, cried.
But, he survived.
The next case occurred in a town only a short distance "up the Pike." Similar circumstances. Gas jockey, pretty girl, midnight shift. But this guy held out for weeks before he concluded, "She is looking at me! She loves me!" and then "turned amorous." One night the girl, very pretty but mechanically adept, opened the hood of her car and bent over and used a heavy pair of channel locks to remove a part from her engine to show him how the engine worked better without it. He walked up behind her and leaned his front against her behind, and reached around and grabbed her chest. She freaked out and pushed him away and slammed him in the face with the steel channel locks, and a policeman who had seen him lean against her that way and her reaction arrested the injured young man for sexual assault.
When the same Punjabi translator came up from Washington, D.C. for the case, she was puzzled at a second case so very much like the first. Because the girl had left the young man with a deep permanent scar from his forehead across his eye to his cheek, when we explained that the girl had been accidentally giving him Punjabi "go signs" for weeks she forgave him and asked that the charges be dismissed.
The third case was the worst. The girl was very pretty, very personable, and -- thank God -- very understanding. But she was married to a policeman! And, she was eight months pregnant at the time of the incident!
The girl and her police officer husband lived next to the gas station. She regularly went into the gas station mini-mart, and purchased household needs -- bread and milk and such -- and engaged the young man, whose wife was still back in the Punjab, in pleasant conversation. She said, "I was much taken with that guy's innocence! He seemed like such a good man!" She was well-endowed and otherwise very beautiful before becoming pregnant. After she became pregnant, she was even more "well-endowed."
She flew home to her mother's house in the Midwest for her baby shower. On her return, her husband picked her up at the airport after he finished working the second shift in his town as a patrolman. When they arrived back at the house next to the gas station and mini-mart, the eight-months-pregnant wife walked over to the mini-mart for some OJ. As she smiled pleasantly at her Punjabi gas jockey friend behind the cash register, he was feeling particularly lonely that night. His libido finally gave way. He thought, "SHE LOOKS AT ME SO MUCH! SHE MUST LOVE ME!" As she turned to go home, he reached over the counter, grabbed her boobs from behind, pulled the shocked girl over the counter and began kissing her madly on the lips as she flailed wildly.
From the driveway her husband saw his pregnant wife's flailing legs, thought, "Wha-a-a-at!" and ran over to the store with his gun drawn. He exploded through the door, screaming, "YOU BASTARD! GET YOUR HANDS OFF MY WIFE!"
He pulled his wife away from the shocked Punjabi, punched him very hard in the face, threw him to the floor, sat on him, and shoved the barrel of his his .45 into his mouth while he called on his cell phone for back-up.
I invited the wife and her police officer husband to the arraignment hearing -- the hearing where the indictment is read to the accused. When the translator came up from the embassy in Washington, and she realized that it was another "boob case," despite the seriousness of the charge she burst out laughing. She said, "We are going to have to do something about this, Mr. Dawson!"
The prosecutor knew me well, understood why I invited the victim and her husband to the arraignment, and agreed to let me and the translator speak to them alone in an empty courtroom. When I went over the facts with the translator, she said, "You are right. This is another one of those cases." The husband "wanted blood," but he listened carefully, with his wife, as the translator explained how cultural differences led to the man being enticed by the woman. "When they come over here to this county," she said, "They work 16 hours a day and send money back home to their families. That's it. That's all there is to their lives. They have no time to learn about this country and its culture and the language. They stay 100% Punjabi. When you were kind enough to talk to him, you innocently looked him in the eyes as you talked to him, the way we all do in America, and by that means you accidentally behaved in a way that in his part of India means, 'I may be pregnant, but I may be interested in having sex with you!'" I added, "Listen, it really was just circumstances, and your husband's response, based on what he saw, was 100% appropriate! But it was all really just a cultural misunderstanding. It really was. When cultures mix, it's 'oil and water.' The mix doesn't work out, and generates bizarre results."
The wife, to her credit, understood and relented. Over her husband's objections, she agreed to a plea to a greatly reduced charge, 5 years probation, and a $5,000 fine.
After that, the embassy caused the Indian government to require émigrés from the suspect sections of India to sit through lectures on American culture and American sexuality, to control the problem -- in effect, "IF AMERICAN GIRLS LOOK AT YOU AND SMILE, IT DOESN'T MEAN, 'I WANT SEX.'"
I haven't heard of any more cases of this sort in our area.
Saturday, July 24, 2010
A Lady of No Reputation Who Was Simply Amazing, Part IX
THE DAWSON'S COME TO AMERICA
In early February, 1851, 20 year old G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON, crushed by the death of his first wife, and sick to death of waiting for employment in London, bade farewell to friends and family in London (perhaps Thomas and Ann Dawson and their son William, also of Christ Church in Spitalfields -- relatives?), and made his way from London to Liverpool. In Liverpool he walked to the docks, and seeing the recently-arrived American-made packet ship "Washington" tied up to the wharf belonging to Taylor, Crooke & Co., the Liverpool agent for the famous Black Star Line, went into the ticket office in front of the wharf and inquired about the price of passage.
"Berths" aboard the Washington ranged from 3 pounds, 15 shillings to 4 pounds for a crate-like "cot" bolted to the deck side of the gunwales, to 5 pounds for a space in a cabin. Any of these fares were enormously more economical than the cost of the trans-oceanic voyage for an individual during the previous century, due to the effects of economies of scale as emigration out of the British Isles increased after the commencement of the Potato Famine. The amount of 4 pounds amount to about 2 weeks' wages for a common laborer during this period. Perhaps WILLIAM chose the mid-range fare of 4 pounds, and then registered. He stated that his name was "William Dawson." He gave his age as "20." He described himself as "a citizen of England" who worked as a "laborer." The clerk for Taylor, Crooke & Co. then gave G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON his ticket for his voyage.
The ticket promised, per day, 3 quarts of water, and, per week, 2-1/2 pounds of bread, 1 pound of flour, 5 pounds of oatmeal, 2 pounds of rice, 2 ounces of tea, 8 ounces of sugar and molasses, vinegar, and 1 pound of boned pork. The reality would turn out to be far less pleasant than the promise.
The "Washington" was built specifically to bus Potato Famine emigrants from the British Isles to America. It was about 200 feet in length, weighed about 1,600 tons in drydock, had a wide beam, and was very sturdily built and easily able to withstand the worst storms the Atlantic could throw at her year round. The ship was commanded by Ship's Master A. Page, while the crew consisted of 4 Ship's Mates, 5 officers including Ship's Doctor Charles Reynolds, and 31 sailors. About 900 passengers were booked to make the passage across the Atlantic with G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON.
On or about February 13, 1851, WILLIAM went to the Taylor, Crooke & Co. wharf and waited in line to board. An English doctor asked him his name, asked him if he felt healthy, told him to stick out his tongue, and then, on seeing his tongue, pronounced WILLIAM "fit."
As the line proceeded across the wharf to the gangplank, WILLIAM was undoubtedly surprised and disturbed to see the Ship's Mates pushing, screaming and cursing to herd the emigrants on board as quickly as possible. He may or may not have realized that this was the beginning of their 6 week effort to jam as many fares as possible onto the boat and get them to America as fast as possible, while giving them as little food and water as possible, to maximize profits.
Once all had boarded, the Washington was untied from its wharf, and perhaps after dropping a sail or two allowed to drift out into the River Mersey, where it dropped anchor.
On the first day of the voyage, while the "Washington" lay at anchor only a few hundred yards from the wharf at Liverpool, passengers were instructed to line-up for water. Only the first 30 to line up received their tin of water. The rest were sent
back to their berths. The same thing happened later in the day -- only the first 30 received their water ration.
Probably sometime during the second day, a steamer approached the
"Washington". The "Washington's" crew threw the steamer a bowline which was tied to a post on the stern of the steamer. Once anchor was weighed, the steamer began towing the "Washington" slowly down the River Mersey. As this was being done, roll was taken on board the "Washington." and stowaways returned to the dock on a small boat.
Once she had been towed to the Irish Sea, where the wind was fresh and reliable, the
"Washington" cut loose from the steamer and unfurled its sails.
A week passed. Still, nothing but water had been doled-out to hungry passengers. Finally, Ship's Doctor Reynolds was seen moving from berth to berth, taking note of passengers less than 16 years of age. Though the Black Star Line contract, and naval regulations, permitted half rations only for those who were less than 14 years of age, Captain Page arbitrarily raised that limit to 16. Perhaps he felt that he had a right to to "handicap" to protect against lying by passengers -- assuming, of course, that no food at all during the first week was legitimate.
More days passed with no food being distrubuted. When whipping, cursing, punching and screanming failed to quell the riot for food, food was finally distributed. Some passengers who noticed that the Ship's Cook was very generous to passengers who bribed him with money or whiskey complained, but to no avail. Ultimately, passengers received less than one-half of the provisions promised by their contract.
Fierce and frigid Winter storms slammed against the vessel during the ensuing weeks. When the weather became too rough, sails were reefed-in to protect against capsizing, while gigantic waves of freezing water came crashing over the gunwales into the "berths." Many passengers prayed during such storms. Those who died of the diseases brought with them from Liverpool -- cholera, typhoid, and dyssentery -- were tied-up in cloth bags weighed-down with rocks and tossed overboard.
On March 28, 1851, after Ship's Master Page never once showed his face to the passengers, Doctor Reynolds began walking down the deck between berths, screaming, "Now, then, clean-out and wash-out yours rooms, every one of you, God damn and blast your souls to Hell!" The passengers were greatly cheered by this, realizing as they did that clean-up time meant that they were nearing the American coast, and would soon be able to disembark from their Hell-hole. A short time later, G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON and the other passengers saw with their eyes what Captain Page had seen through his telescope -- the American coast.
Finally, on March 31, 1851, the "Washington" sailed into New York harbor. Passengers crowding against the gunwales stared wide-eyed at the Statue of Liberty, correct? Not at all. It did not even exist in 1851. Then, later the same day, sick passengers were ferried ashore to quarantine on Staten Island. The balance of the passengers stayed on the Washington until it tied-up to the wharf at Ellis Island, a tiny tract of land in New York harbor, then about one-eighth its current size, closer to the Jersey shore than to Manhattan, featuring only a few small wooden buildings. There G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON disembarked with the remaining passengers, was given a brief physical, and waited, until a ferry from New York City arrived to take them ashore. On that day WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON swore allegiance to the United States of America, and he became an American citizen.
In early February, 1851, 20 year old G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON, crushed by the death of his first wife, and sick to death of waiting for employment in London, bade farewell to friends and family in London (perhaps Thomas and Ann Dawson and their son William, also of Christ Church in Spitalfields -- relatives?), and made his way from London to Liverpool. In Liverpool he walked to the docks, and seeing the recently-arrived American-made packet ship "Washington" tied up to the wharf belonging to Taylor, Crooke & Co., the Liverpool agent for the famous Black Star Line, went into the ticket office in front of the wharf and inquired about the price of passage.
"Berths" aboard the Washington ranged from 3 pounds, 15 shillings to 4 pounds for a crate-like "cot" bolted to the deck side of the gunwales, to 5 pounds for a space in a cabin. Any of these fares were enormously more economical than the cost of the trans-oceanic voyage for an individual during the previous century, due to the effects of economies of scale as emigration out of the British Isles increased after the commencement of the Potato Famine. The amount of 4 pounds amount to about 2 weeks' wages for a common laborer during this period. Perhaps WILLIAM chose the mid-range fare of 4 pounds, and then registered. He stated that his name was "William Dawson." He gave his age as "20." He described himself as "a citizen of England" who worked as a "laborer." The clerk for Taylor, Crooke & Co. then gave G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON his ticket for his voyage.
The ticket promised, per day, 3 quarts of water, and, per week, 2-1/2 pounds of bread, 1 pound of flour, 5 pounds of oatmeal, 2 pounds of rice, 2 ounces of tea, 8 ounces of sugar and molasses, vinegar, and 1 pound of boned pork. The reality would turn out to be far less pleasant than the promise.
The "Washington" was built specifically to bus Potato Famine emigrants from the British Isles to America. It was about 200 feet in length, weighed about 1,600 tons in drydock, had a wide beam, and was very sturdily built and easily able to withstand the worst storms the Atlantic could throw at her year round. The ship was commanded by Ship's Master A. Page, while the crew consisted of 4 Ship's Mates, 5 officers including Ship's Doctor Charles Reynolds, and 31 sailors. About 900 passengers were booked to make the passage across the Atlantic with G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON.
On or about February 13, 1851, WILLIAM went to the Taylor, Crooke & Co. wharf and waited in line to board. An English doctor asked him his name, asked him if he felt healthy, told him to stick out his tongue, and then, on seeing his tongue, pronounced WILLIAM "fit."
As the line proceeded across the wharf to the gangplank, WILLIAM was undoubtedly surprised and disturbed to see the Ship's Mates pushing, screaming and cursing to herd the emigrants on board as quickly as possible. He may or may not have realized that this was the beginning of their 6 week effort to jam as many fares as possible onto the boat and get them to America as fast as possible, while giving them as little food and water as possible, to maximize profits.
Once all had boarded, the Washington was untied from its wharf, and perhaps after dropping a sail or two allowed to drift out into the River Mersey, where it dropped anchor.
On the first day of the voyage, while the "Washington" lay at anchor only a few hundred yards from the wharf at Liverpool, passengers were instructed to line-up for water. Only the first 30 to line up received their tin of water. The rest were sent
back to their berths. The same thing happened later in the day -- only the first 30 received their water ration.
Probably sometime during the second day, a steamer approached the
"Washington". The "Washington's" crew threw the steamer a bowline which was tied to a post on the stern of the steamer. Once anchor was weighed, the steamer began towing the "Washington" slowly down the River Mersey. As this was being done, roll was taken on board the "Washington." and stowaways returned to the dock on a small boat.
Once she had been towed to the Irish Sea, where the wind was fresh and reliable, the
"Washington" cut loose from the steamer and unfurled its sails.
A week passed. Still, nothing but water had been doled-out to hungry passengers. Finally, Ship's Doctor Reynolds was seen moving from berth to berth, taking note of passengers less than 16 years of age. Though the Black Star Line contract, and naval regulations, permitted half rations only for those who were less than 14 years of age, Captain Page arbitrarily raised that limit to 16. Perhaps he felt that he had a right to to "handicap" to protect against lying by passengers -- assuming, of course, that no food at all during the first week was legitimate.
More days passed with no food being distrubuted. When whipping, cursing, punching and screanming failed to quell the riot for food, food was finally distributed. Some passengers who noticed that the Ship's Cook was very generous to passengers who bribed him with money or whiskey complained, but to no avail. Ultimately, passengers received less than one-half of the provisions promised by their contract.
Fierce and frigid Winter storms slammed against the vessel during the ensuing weeks. When the weather became too rough, sails were reefed-in to protect against capsizing, while gigantic waves of freezing water came crashing over the gunwales into the "berths." Many passengers prayed during such storms. Those who died of the diseases brought with them from Liverpool -- cholera, typhoid, and dyssentery -- were tied-up in cloth bags weighed-down with rocks and tossed overboard.
On March 28, 1851, after Ship's Master Page never once showed his face to the passengers, Doctor Reynolds began walking down the deck between berths, screaming, "Now, then, clean-out and wash-out yours rooms, every one of you, God damn and blast your souls to Hell!" The passengers were greatly cheered by this, realizing as they did that clean-up time meant that they were nearing the American coast, and would soon be able to disembark from their Hell-hole. A short time later, G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON and the other passengers saw with their eyes what Captain Page had seen through his telescope -- the American coast.
Finally, on March 31, 1851, the "Washington" sailed into New York harbor. Passengers crowding against the gunwales stared wide-eyed at the Statue of Liberty, correct? Not at all. It did not even exist in 1851. Then, later the same day, sick passengers were ferried ashore to quarantine on Staten Island. The balance of the passengers stayed on the Washington until it tied-up to the wharf at Ellis Island, a tiny tract of land in New York harbor, then about one-eighth its current size, closer to the Jersey shore than to Manhattan, featuring only a few small wooden buildings. There G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON disembarked with the remaining passengers, was given a brief physical, and waited, until a ferry from New York City arrived to take them ashore. On that day WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON swore allegiance to the United States of America, and he became an American citizen.
A Lady of No Reputation Who Was Simply Amazing, Part VIII
Dore's Portrait of East End Squalor
Wash Day in the East End
Christ Church, in Spitalfields, London, the Anglican ChurchWhere William Samuel Charles Dawson Was Baptized
Street Urchins in 19th Century London
LONDON ROOTS OF THE DAWSON'S
During most of the first half of the 19th century, while English overlords in London's West End collected rents from their stolen Irish estates, and demolished Irish industry by flooding Ireland with cheap English manufactures after the Act of Union indirectly eliminated all trade barriers, London's neighborhoods for the working classes in the East End boomed as employment opportunities in London's newly-mechanized factories grew in number. The new neighborhoods lacked sewage facilities -- toilet and wash water drained into the Thames from open gullies in the streets. Public transportation was just then coming into its own, so that steam locomotives at street level or on elevated tracks belched steam, oil, sparks and smoke into adjacent streets. In short order new neighborhoods became overcrowded working-class ghettoes. Cholera, typhus and dyssentery spread via the open sewers. Mini-epidemics of these diseases, wiping out this section and that neighborhood of London's East End, became commonplace. Especially during the Summer, the smell in London began to become so unbearable that Parliament actually considered leaving for a pleasanter location.
Around 1810, somewhere in these interesting neighborhoods in London's East End, a little boy name WILLIAM DAWSON was born to one working-class family, and a little girl named SARAH TRAVELLER was born to another working class family. These would become our G2 GPs, the parents of G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON.
Both G2 GF WILLIAM DAWSON and G2 GM SARAH TRAVELLER would have been baptized into the Church of England by their parents.
The London of the first half of the 19th century is well-portrayed in Dickens' novels. On the East End, it really was a despicable place. Both G2 GF WILLIAM DAWSON and G2 GM SARAH TRAVELLER would have "lived lives of quiet desperation" in their families, going out to work, without much education, if any, as early in their teen years as possible to supplement family income. There is some evidence that they met and engaged in an intimate relationship before marriage, and that G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON was conceived and born before their marriage, a not-uncommon thing in the disorganized lives of the denizens of the East End in those days, according to books on the subject.
G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON's early years would not have been much different from that of his parents. As a member of the working class in London's dirty East End, he would have been poorly educated, and forced out to work as early as possible in his teen years. WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON's classsification, on his immigration record, as a mere "laborer" bears this out. Who knows when his parents died, and why. Perhaps one of the many cholera, typhoid or dyssentery epidemics, borne through London by the sewers, did them in.
It was customary for young men in London's East End to commit themselves to marriage at around the age of 17 or 18. G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON apparently did so, probably around 1848. We really know nothing at all about his wife, except that, according to family tradition, she died shortly after their marriage, perhaps of one of the mini-epidemics of cholera, typhoid or dyssentery which came out of London's open sewers on a regular basis, or perhaps she was one of the 250,000 victims of the great tuberculosis epidemic which assailed the population of London and its suburbs between 1850 and 1855.
While 1848 was a deadly year in Ireland, 1848 and subsequent years were difficult years in London's East End. When the Potato Famine hit Ireland, the Irish suddenly had nothing, so that English exports to Ireland plummeted. Elsewhere throughout Europe, the failure of the potato crops due to the same fungus caused food prices, generally, to rise, resulting in a massive shift of cash from industry into farming, further drying-up markets for England's manufactures. Suddenly, the working class in London's East End, and throughout Europe, were thrown out of work. Unemployment as a consequence of the failure of the potato famine is the major caused of the violent revolutions wracking government across Western Europe in 1848.
The employment picture would not have been too pretty for G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON during this period. Though London avoided a revolution in 1848, emigration to America of the chronically unemployed began to skyrocket. Hundreds of thousands of English young people began to join the Irish crammed into the windjammers out of Liverpool, hoping for a better life in America. WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON was one of these.
A Lady of No Reputation Who Was Simply Amazing, Part VII
Eviction day: After Parliament "taxed the problem to eliminate it,"by adopting thge Four Pound Clause -- a $3,000 annual penalty on every
quarter acre set up for potato cultivation -- English landlords evicted every
Irish family, previously forced by them into n potato farmjing,
from every potato plot to avoid the penalty; 4,000,000 Irish Catholics
were suddenly homeless; 1,500,000 died in Ireland;
250,000 died on the ships to America
In drawings from the era, the men are frequently absent;they died giving up their food to the women and children,
or charging the docks, crammed with food being exported by Engliush landlords,
in the famous "skeleton armies"
Relief measures were only sufficient to help about one-fifth of the evicted, starving Catholic families. The rest walked until they died of starvation. The Roman Catholic Church was illegal. Therefore, only the Protestant churches could publicly maintain active soup kitchens. Some of these required conversion to Protestantism before food was provided -- the famous "soupers." Many starving parents had to decide whether to bury the first of their children to die, or butcher and cook the dead to feed their living children. While the bellies of the young swelled enormously in response to the complete absence of food, dogs left behind by their dead masters formed packs and began unearthing famine victims from shallow graves, so that their bellies became swollen with human flesh. The image of the leprachaun with swollen belly, skinny limbs, and thin, curly facial hair which we see in today's cartoons dates from this period -- that is what an Irish boy looked like shortly before death from starvation, down to whispy, prematurely-sprouting facial hair.
As pregnant ANNA and her husband slowly starved, since they apparently lived in Londonderry County they functionally starved in front of their Protestant neighbors. The experience must have very, very drastically impacted their outlook. Though he is completely unrelated to us, ANNA's first husband Mr. Mallon should probably be remembered as someone who gave his life for our G1 GM. He died; pregnant ANNA didn't.
At a particular point ANNA gave birth. How she must have agonized when she realized that her baby, great aunt BARBARA MALLON, was blind! Perhaps ANNA ultimately received some assistance from one of the poorhouses erected after the beginning of the famine. At a particular point, ANNA decided to join the millions of Catholic Irish who were emigrating to America to survive. A tiny amount of indirect evidence suggests that ANNA made application for funds from one of the several English philanthropists who were paying for passage to America.
Probably around the year 1848, G1 GM ANNA FULLER, only about 19 years of age, holding the tiny hand of her blind little daughter, great aunt BARBARA MALLON, boarded one of the steamers out of Londonderry carrying emigrants to Liverpool. "At last," she may have thought, "I will escape hardship and find an easier life in America." And she did -- kind of.
The great packet ships built to carry people from the British Isles to America had not yet come into their own. Early-on in the Potato Famine years most passengers were carried in windjammers originally built to carry cargo across the Atlantic, but converted to move people.
The voyage across the Atlantic took about six weeks. I will tell the story of such a voyage in the narrative on G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON, since it is so well documented in his case.
It is more likely than not that g1 gm ANNA FULLER and her little daughter BARBARA MALLON came to the United States through Canada, and that therefore their point of disembarkation was Grosse Isle in the St. Lawrence Seaway, about 30 miles east of the city of Quebec (not the Grosse Isle out in the Atlantic). Grosse Isle, one of Canada's most important quaratine sites, was a horrible place. Many thousands of Irish who emigrated during the famine years died there of typhoid, cholera and dyssentery, if they survived the voyage across the Atlantic. Though the British government hoped that many of the Irish disembarking at Grosse Isle would stay in Canada, in fact the overwhelming number of those who survived quarantine either had themselves ferried up the St. Lawrence Seaway if they had money, or ferried to shore if they didn't so that they could walk south to the United States.
Somehow, ANNA moved south into the United States with her little daughter, all of the way to Philadelphia, so that in 1851 ANNA was living at #3 Goldsmith Court in Philadelphia, as described in the 1852 Philadelphia Directory (which explains in its introductory passages that it is published in the beginning of 1852, using the very latest 1851 information). Why Philadelphia? The answer may have been the famous Pennsylvania Institution for the Instruction of the Blind, at 20th and Race Streets in Philadelphia. An oral tradition of the family hints that ANNA may have had her daughter BARBARA MALLON boarded there.
Not too long after her arrival in Philadelphia G1 GM ANNA FULLER met and married her second husband, our ancestor G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON, whose story we shall now commence.
TO BE CONTINUED
As pregnant ANNA and her husband slowly starved, since they apparently lived in Londonderry County they functionally starved in front of their Protestant neighbors. The experience must have very, very drastically impacted their outlook. Though he is completely unrelated to us, ANNA's first husband Mr. Mallon should probably be remembered as someone who gave his life for our G1 GM. He died; pregnant ANNA didn't.
At a particular point ANNA gave birth. How she must have agonized when she realized that her baby, great aunt BARBARA MALLON, was blind! Perhaps ANNA ultimately received some assistance from one of the poorhouses erected after the beginning of the famine. At a particular point, ANNA decided to join the millions of Catholic Irish who were emigrating to America to survive. A tiny amount of indirect evidence suggests that ANNA made application for funds from one of the several English philanthropists who were paying for passage to America.
Probably around the year 1848, G1 GM ANNA FULLER, only about 19 years of age, holding the tiny hand of her blind little daughter, great aunt BARBARA MALLON, boarded one of the steamers out of Londonderry carrying emigrants to Liverpool. "At last," she may have thought, "I will escape hardship and find an easier life in America." And she did -- kind of.
The great packet ships built to carry people from the British Isles to America had not yet come into their own. Early-on in the Potato Famine years most passengers were carried in windjammers originally built to carry cargo across the Atlantic, but converted to move people.
The voyage across the Atlantic took about six weeks. I will tell the story of such a voyage in the narrative on G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON, since it is so well documented in his case.
It is more likely than not that g1 gm ANNA FULLER and her little daughter BARBARA MALLON came to the United States through Canada, and that therefore their point of disembarkation was Grosse Isle in the St. Lawrence Seaway, about 30 miles east of the city of Quebec (not the Grosse Isle out in the Atlantic). Grosse Isle, one of Canada's most important quaratine sites, was a horrible place. Many thousands of Irish who emigrated during the famine years died there of typhoid, cholera and dyssentery, if they survived the voyage across the Atlantic. Though the British government hoped that many of the Irish disembarking at Grosse Isle would stay in Canada, in fact the overwhelming number of those who survived quarantine either had themselves ferried up the St. Lawrence Seaway if they had money, or ferried to shore if they didn't so that they could walk south to the United States.
Somehow, ANNA moved south into the United States with her little daughter, all of the way to Philadelphia, so that in 1851 ANNA was living at #3 Goldsmith Court in Philadelphia, as described in the 1852 Philadelphia Directory (which explains in its introductory passages that it is published in the beginning of 1852, using the very latest 1851 information). Why Philadelphia? The answer may have been the famous Pennsylvania Institution for the Instruction of the Blind, at 20th and Race Streets in Philadelphia. An oral tradition of the family hints that ANNA may have had her daughter BARBARA MALLON boarded there.
Not too long after her arrival in Philadelphia G1 GM ANNA FULLER met and married her second husband, our ancestor G1 GF WILLIAM SAMUEL CHARLES DAWSON, whose story we shall now commence.
TO BE CONTINUED
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
A Lady of No Reputation Who Was Simply Amazing, Part V
After the bloody 17th century, the antagonism of the Catholic Irish toward English Protestantism was way too deeply imbued to be erased. The Irish social order was collapsed by the English, but there was a new psychology in its place -- far more defensive, far stronger than anything ever confronted by the English. Cromwell, in committing genocide, and the subsequent invasion by the English in the Williamite War, left the Irish culture with a very permanent bad taste in its mouth.
As the 18th century progressed, English overlords, ruling their stolen lands, forced the Irish to grow crops for export only.
At the same time, the price of those crops was driven down slightly by imposing large tariffs on Irish exports to England, while exempting English goods exported to Ireland from tariffs, milking Ireland's economy, but badly injuring Irish welfare in the process.
As this process continued, Irish anger began to build. Extremely cold winters generating a food shortage in 1740 and 1741 was made ten times worse by the English economic policy. 400,000 Irish -- about one-eighth of the population, died.
The oppression of Irish grew so fierce that Protestant Irish and Norman Irish united with some Catholics to form the Society of United Irishmen to pressure the English into permitting Irish self-rule. When it became clear that the English were determined to only exploit the Irish, anger exploded into Wolfe Tone's Irish Rebellion of 1798.
Wolfe Tone induced the French to try to land a very large army in Ireland in 1796, but severe storms made the landing impossible and the soldiers were returned to France. Accompanying acts of sabotage by Irish rebels shocked the English into terrorizing the Irish with mass burnings, torture and murder of both Catholic and Protestant Irish. Comprehending the impact of indiscriminate torture and murder -- a much more united Ireland -- the British military recommended manipulating Irish Protestants with reports that the British government was only suppressing a "popish" conspiracy. The documents verifying this are very clear.
As the British noose tightened, alarmed Ireland exploded.
Armed guerilla units attacked British army units and forts from all sides. England poured thousands of troops into Ireland. By-and-large, the trained British, assisted by native loyalists, carried the day. Catholic and Protestant rebels were relentlessly pursued. There was little taking of prisoners by the British. Captives, healthy and injured, were tortured and murdered. Their families were raped, tortured and murdered.
The rebels struck back with localized terror, but there was no comparison with British terror.
The French landed a small force of 1,000 regulars accompanied by Wolfe Tone. 5,000 rebels joined them. At Castlebar the British retreated in panic, suffering an embarrassing defeat. Ultimately, the British prevailed, capturing the French and rebels. French prisoners were traded for British prisoners. Irish rebels were murdered.
By the end of 1798 the rebellion had lost its steam. The last of the rebels' guerilla groups did not surrender until 1804, however.
Afterwards, the British used the divide-and-conquer method in Ireland, favoring Irish Protestants while terribly oppressing Irish Catholics. Catholicism was essentially outlawed. Agriculture was "reformed," as four-fifths of the Irish Catholics were forced into potato cultivation, recently discovered by British landlords in London's West End as a means of maximizing profits, setting the stage for the greatest catastrophe of all.
Next chapter: Annie's story.
As the 18th century progressed, English overlords, ruling their stolen lands, forced the Irish to grow crops for export only.
At the same time, the price of those crops was driven down slightly by imposing large tariffs on Irish exports to England, while exempting English goods exported to Ireland from tariffs, milking Ireland's economy, but badly injuring Irish welfare in the process.
As this process continued, Irish anger began to build. Extremely cold winters generating a food shortage in 1740 and 1741 was made ten times worse by the English economic policy. 400,000 Irish -- about one-eighth of the population, died.
The oppression of Irish grew so fierce that Protestant Irish and Norman Irish united with some Catholics to form the Society of United Irishmen to pressure the English into permitting Irish self-rule. When it became clear that the English were determined to only exploit the Irish, anger exploded into Wolfe Tone's Irish Rebellion of 1798.
Wolfe Tone induced the French to try to land a very large army in Ireland in 1796, but severe storms made the landing impossible and the soldiers were returned to France. Accompanying acts of sabotage by Irish rebels shocked the English into terrorizing the Irish with mass burnings, torture and murder of both Catholic and Protestant Irish. Comprehending the impact of indiscriminate torture and murder -- a much more united Ireland -- the British military recommended manipulating Irish Protestants with reports that the British government was only suppressing a "popish" conspiracy. The documents verifying this are very clear.
As the British noose tightened, alarmed Ireland exploded.
Armed guerilla units attacked British army units and forts from all sides. England poured thousands of troops into Ireland. By-and-large, the trained British, assisted by native loyalists, carried the day. Catholic and Protestant rebels were relentlessly pursued. There was little taking of prisoners by the British. Captives, healthy and injured, were tortured and murdered. Their families were raped, tortured and murdered.
The rebels struck back with localized terror, but there was no comparison with British terror.
The French landed a small force of 1,000 regulars accompanied by Wolfe Tone. 5,000 rebels joined them. At Castlebar the British retreated in panic, suffering an embarrassing defeat. Ultimately, the British prevailed, capturing the French and rebels. French prisoners were traded for British prisoners. Irish rebels were murdered.
By the end of 1798 the rebellion had lost its steam. The last of the rebels' guerilla groups did not surrender until 1804, however.
Afterwards, the British used the divide-and-conquer method in Ireland, favoring Irish Protestants while terribly oppressing Irish Catholics. Catholicism was essentially outlawed. Agriculture was "reformed," as four-fifths of the Irish Catholics were forced into potato cultivation, recently discovered by British landlords in London's West End as a means of maximizing profits, setting the stage for the greatest catastrophe of all.
Next chapter: Annie's story.
Saturday, July 17, 2010
How the Liberal Media Chews Us Up and Spits Us Out
.
The American media -- the free press -- really is one of the linchpins of democracy. It really does help to keep us free.
But, just because it is so important does not mean that Original Sin -- human moral imperfection -- does not run rampant through the media.
Example One: "Amistad," 1997, with Djimon Hounsou, Morgan Freeman, Anthony Hopkins and Matthew McConaughey, portrays Cinque, the black leader who won his freedom from white slave traders by taking control of the slave ship Amistad, and then he wins the right to return to Africa after the Supreme Court of the United States permits him to do so -- imaginative, bold Africans and benevolent white liberals conquer the exploitative white slave traders, right?
In reality, Cinque returned to Africa and made his living as a slave trader, capturing and imprisoning and selling black men, women and children.
Why didn't they tell us this, in the movie?
Example Two: What do we never, ever, ever read in the media about the priests who victimize young people?
We read that they are "pedophiles," "pederasts," "sexual abusers," "ephebophiles" -- but never, ever, ever do we read that they are
homosexual.
They are.
It's not an accident that 9/10ths of the victims are male.
It's not an accident that 5/6ths of the victims have entered puberty.
The offender priests, in fact, are in the overwhelming majority gay men hunting for prime beef.
Homosexuals are the poster child of the liberal media. So, the media doesn't want you to think like that, so they silently conspire to avoid telling you that.
Example Three: What does the media fall all over itself to avoid telling us about terrorism?
Answer: That the overwhelming majority of the terrorists are Muslims.
For whatever reason, Islam seems to beget large numbers of killers.
.
The American media -- the free press -- really is one of the linchpins of democracy. It really does help to keep us free.
But, just because it is so important does not mean that Original Sin -- human moral imperfection -- does not run rampant through the media.
Example One: "Amistad," 1997, with Djimon Hounsou, Morgan Freeman, Anthony Hopkins and Matthew McConaughey, portrays Cinque, the black leader who won his freedom from white slave traders by taking control of the slave ship Amistad, and then he wins the right to return to Africa after the Supreme Court of the United States permits him to do so -- imaginative, bold Africans and benevolent white liberals conquer the exploitative white slave traders, right?
In reality, Cinque returned to Africa and made his living as a slave trader, capturing and imprisoning and selling black men, women and children.
Why didn't they tell us this, in the movie?
Example Two: What do we never, ever, ever read in the media about the priests who victimize young people?
We read that they are "pedophiles," "pederasts," "sexual abusers," "ephebophiles" -- but never, ever, ever do we read that they are
homosexual.
They are.
It's not an accident that 9/10ths of the victims are male.
It's not an accident that 5/6ths of the victims have entered puberty.
The offender priests, in fact, are in the overwhelming majority gay men hunting for prime beef.
Homosexuals are the poster child of the liberal media. So, the media doesn't want you to think like that, so they silently conspire to avoid telling you that.
Example Three: What does the media fall all over itself to avoid telling us about terrorism?
Answer: That the overwhelming majority of the terrorists are Muslims.
For whatever reason, Islam seems to beget large numbers of killers.
.
Saturday, July 10, 2010
University of Illinois: Liberal, or Nazi?
A Catholic professor HIRED to teach about Catholicism at the University of Illinois was about to give an exam in part on the distinction between moral decision making based on utilitarianism, rejected by the Catholic Church because it is ultimately subjective, and moral decision making based on Natural Law asking the question, Does the behavior in question conform to reality?
In class and in the e-mail in question, the professor used sexual issues -- what every student wants to debate -- as the subject matter to be employed by the two approaches to moral decision making in hypotheticals analyzing the approaches.
Because he felt that the discussion in class had been a little to "thin" to fully equip students for the coming exam, the professor re-discussed the issue in an e-mail to all students...
http://www.news-gazette.com/news/religion/2010-07-09/e-mail-prompted-complaint-over-ui-religion-class-instructor.html
A student who apparently felt that the professor should be barred from stating that the Churcvh teaches that gay sex acts are immoral -- in fact, it does teach this -- used the e-mail as a basis for accusing the professor of "hate speech"...
http://www.news-gazette.com/news/religion/2010-07-09/e-mail-complaint-student-about-ui-religion-instructor.html
The University of Illinois fired the professor.
I can tell the portion of the e-mail by the libelous student which caused the professor to be fired. It was the part about notifying the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Resource Center, as well as the Daily Illini, as well as the founder of the Queer Studies major on the campus.
The Religion Department undoubtedly had visions of protesters with (gasp!) signs protesting in front of the building housing the Religious Studies Department.
Instead of being part of the student's private successful campaign of terror, it would be wonderful if local gay rights organizations PROTESTED THE PROFESSOR'S FIRING.
People might respect them, instead of looking at gays as intellectual Nazis.
University of Illinois, you may be liberal, but your actions remind me more of Jewish store closings by the Nazis in Germany.
In truth, you're not liberal.
You're not Nazi.
You're cowards.
And so you have no dignity.
In class and in the e-mail in question, the professor used sexual issues -- what every student wants to debate -- as the subject matter to be employed by the two approaches to moral decision making in hypotheticals analyzing the approaches.
Because he felt that the discussion in class had been a little to "thin" to fully equip students for the coming exam, the professor re-discussed the issue in an e-mail to all students...
http://www.news-gazette.com/news/religion/2010-07-09/e-mail-prompted-complaint-over-ui-religion-class-instructor.html
A student who apparently felt that the professor should be barred from stating that the Churcvh teaches that gay sex acts are immoral -- in fact, it does teach this -- used the e-mail as a basis for accusing the professor of "hate speech"...
http://www.news-gazette.com/news/religion/2010-07-09/e-mail-complaint-student-about-ui-religion-instructor.html
The University of Illinois fired the professor.
I can tell the portion of the e-mail by the libelous student which caused the professor to be fired. It was the part about notifying the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Resource Center, as well as the Daily Illini, as well as the founder of the Queer Studies major on the campus.
The Religion Department undoubtedly had visions of protesters with (gasp!) signs protesting in front of the building housing the Religious Studies Department.
Instead of being part of the student's private successful campaign of terror, it would be wonderful if local gay rights organizations PROTESTED THE PROFESSOR'S FIRING.
People might respect them, instead of looking at gays as intellectual Nazis.
University of Illinois, you may be liberal, but your actions remind me more of Jewish store closings by the Nazis in Germany.
In truth, you're not liberal.
You're not Nazi.
You're cowards.
And so you have no dignity.
Monday, July 5, 2010
The 1960 Nuclear Accident in Ocean County, New Jersey
All of us have "earliest memories." One of my early memories is so vague and improbable that I wasn't sure whether it is a vague memory of reality or a memory of a vague dream. It runs like this...
It is around 1960. I am 7 years of age, asleep in my parents' home in the Frankford section of Philadelphia. It is the middle of the night. A loud roaring on the street outside awakens me. I get up out of bed and look out. There I see a very large tractor-trailer, where the trailer is a flatbed carrying a large white missile. It looked like this...
http://www.600ckat.com/images/2009/bomarc.jpg
...but the rear 2/3s of the missile on the flatbed was covered with a light-colored tarp.
I thought something to myself like, "The government moves rockets through the streets at night?"
Again, was that real, or just the memory of a dream?
Years later, a kind of X-Files-style "Deep Throat" walked up to me in Municipal Court in New Jersey and told me something that suggested to me that it might have not been a dream.
"Deep Throat" was a government researcher who had done work on the effects of acid rain. He said, "You look like a pretty good lawyer. Could you help me with something? Some lawyers are suing some companies for polluting the water table in Toms River, Ocean County, New Jersey, causing some very exotic cancers in Toms River. Could you call those lawyers and tell them that a the government's own research indicates that the government caused the Toms River cancer deaths?
"It happened like this. In 1960, a BOMARC Missile in Fort Dix, Burlington County, armed with a plutonium nuclear warhead, exploded and caught fire. Local volunteer fire companies responding to the fire poured water on the flames, spreading plutonium shrapnel all over the site. Many of the firemen died of radiation poisoning. The government responded to the mess by covering it over with a sheet of concrete and throwing up a fence around it.
"Everything was fine until along came acid rain. As certain industries in the United States and Canada began spewing exhaust into the atmosphere, the particles in the exhaust mixed with water in the clouds and generated acid rain.
"Acid rain, it turns out, mixed with the plutonium in the soil beneath the concrete at the Fort Dix site, and formed the only plutonium compound which is water-soluable. So, extremely radioactive plutonium began issuing-forth out from under the concrete pad in Burlington County, into the water table. It washed into the headwaters of streams which ended-up in Toms River, in Ocean County, New Jersey. I believe that the plutonium was sucked-into the water supply system of Toms River, New Jersey, causing all of those people to die of the exotic cancers, there. The lawyers should be suing the United States government -- not those companies. I think that those companies are innocent of any wrongdoing."
I went back to my office and checked out "Deep Throat's" facts. He was mostly correct. In the 1950s, the government began erecting BOMARC Missile sites near several US cities. The BOMARC Missile, I was surprised to learn, relied on the same kind of technology as the rumored Aurora spyplane -- a rocket engine lifted the BOMARC into the air, and sped it up to above the speed of sound, when the speed of the air entering intakes on the BOMARC was large enough to enable ramjets to take over the load. Ramjets carried the BOMARC to up to 65,000 feet, and a Westinghouse tracking system enabled the BOMARC to zero-in on flights of incoming bombers. When the BOMARC was close enough, the on-board 8 to 10 kiliton plutonium device would explode, destroying the enemy bombers.
On June 7, 1960, a tank of Helium in one of these nuclear-armed BOMARC Missiles, at a small BOMARC missile launch site in the Ocean County end of Fort Dix, New Jersey, in Plumstead Township, just off County Route 539 about 2 miles north of Route 70, exploded, setting-off a huge fire. I could not find an article verifying that firemen had died, but a 1960 article by David Neese of the Trentonian verified that "military firefighters and volunteers from nearby small towns began to converge on the scene." Neese added, though the government had assured personnel that there was no danger from radioactivity, "Some of the small-town firefighters at the scene wondered, though. They'd noticed the 'green men' poking and probing around the base. These were eight-man military nuclear warfare whose members wore green protective outfits." I.e., if there was zero danger from radiation, why were they wearing radiation suits?
Finally, checking maps, I verified that the site was close to headwaters of streams emptying into Toms River.
I examined photos of BOMARC Missiles, and, sure enough, that's what the missile on the flatbed looked-like in my memory, jutting from beneath the tarp, in size and shape. Probably, a crew was rushing a replacement missile to Fort Dix, and became lost in Northeast Philadelphia.
In any event, I decided that I was looking at probable cause, and so I contacted one of the lawyers in the Toms River lawsuit.
They weren't interested in what the whistleblower, "Deep Throat," had to say. They explained, "Look, we're really close to a settlement, here. If you're right, the defendants and their insurance carriers will be 'off the hook.' We will have to start over from scratch, and probably spend decades fighting a government which doesn't want to take responsibility."
So, nothing happened.
But I wonder if anyone else is dying of exotic forms of cancer in Toms River.
It is around 1960. I am 7 years of age, asleep in my parents' home in the Frankford section of Philadelphia. It is the middle of the night. A loud roaring on the street outside awakens me. I get up out of bed and look out. There I see a very large tractor-trailer, where the trailer is a flatbed carrying a large white missile. It looked like this...
http://www.600ckat.com/images/2009/bomarc.jpg
...but the rear 2/3s of the missile on the flatbed was covered with a light-colored tarp.
I thought something to myself like, "The government moves rockets through the streets at night?"
Again, was that real, or just the memory of a dream?
Years later, a kind of X-Files-style "Deep Throat" walked up to me in Municipal Court in New Jersey and told me something that suggested to me that it might have not been a dream.
"Deep Throat" was a government researcher who had done work on the effects of acid rain. He said, "You look like a pretty good lawyer. Could you help me with something? Some lawyers are suing some companies for polluting the water table in Toms River, Ocean County, New Jersey, causing some very exotic cancers in Toms River. Could you call those lawyers and tell them that a the government's own research indicates that the government caused the Toms River cancer deaths?
"It happened like this. In 1960, a BOMARC Missile in Fort Dix, Burlington County, armed with a plutonium nuclear warhead, exploded and caught fire. Local volunteer fire companies responding to the fire poured water on the flames, spreading plutonium shrapnel all over the site. Many of the firemen died of radiation poisoning. The government responded to the mess by covering it over with a sheet of concrete and throwing up a fence around it.
"Everything was fine until along came acid rain. As certain industries in the United States and Canada began spewing exhaust into the atmosphere, the particles in the exhaust mixed with water in the clouds and generated acid rain.
"Acid rain, it turns out, mixed with the plutonium in the soil beneath the concrete at the Fort Dix site, and formed the only plutonium compound which is water-soluable. So, extremely radioactive plutonium began issuing-forth out from under the concrete pad in Burlington County, into the water table. It washed into the headwaters of streams which ended-up in Toms River, in Ocean County, New Jersey. I believe that the plutonium was sucked-into the water supply system of Toms River, New Jersey, causing all of those people to die of the exotic cancers, there. The lawyers should be suing the United States government -- not those companies. I think that those companies are innocent of any wrongdoing."
I went back to my office and checked out "Deep Throat's" facts. He was mostly correct. In the 1950s, the government began erecting BOMARC Missile sites near several US cities. The BOMARC Missile, I was surprised to learn, relied on the same kind of technology as the rumored Aurora spyplane -- a rocket engine lifted the BOMARC into the air, and sped it up to above the speed of sound, when the speed of the air entering intakes on the BOMARC was large enough to enable ramjets to take over the load. Ramjets carried the BOMARC to up to 65,000 feet, and a Westinghouse tracking system enabled the BOMARC to zero-in on flights of incoming bombers. When the BOMARC was close enough, the on-board 8 to 10 kiliton plutonium device would explode, destroying the enemy bombers.
On June 7, 1960, a tank of Helium in one of these nuclear-armed BOMARC Missiles, at a small BOMARC missile launch site in the Ocean County end of Fort Dix, New Jersey, in Plumstead Township, just off County Route 539 about 2 miles north of Route 70, exploded, setting-off a huge fire. I could not find an article verifying that firemen had died, but a 1960 article by David Neese of the Trentonian verified that "military firefighters and volunteers from nearby small towns began to converge on the scene." Neese added, though the government had assured personnel that there was no danger from radioactivity, "Some of the small-town firefighters at the scene wondered, though. They'd noticed the 'green men' poking and probing around the base. These were eight-man military nuclear warfare whose members wore green protective outfits." I.e., if there was zero danger from radiation, why were they wearing radiation suits?
Finally, checking maps, I verified that the site was close to headwaters of streams emptying into Toms River.
I examined photos of BOMARC Missiles, and, sure enough, that's what the missile on the flatbed looked-like in my memory, jutting from beneath the tarp, in size and shape. Probably, a crew was rushing a replacement missile to Fort Dix, and became lost in Northeast Philadelphia.
In any event, I decided that I was looking at probable cause, and so I contacted one of the lawyers in the Toms River lawsuit.
They weren't interested in what the whistleblower, "Deep Throat," had to say. They explained, "Look, we're really close to a settlement, here. If you're right, the defendants and their insurance carriers will be 'off the hook.' We will have to start over from scratch, and probably spend decades fighting a government which doesn't want to take responsibility."
So, nothing happened.
But I wonder if anyone else is dying of exotic forms of cancer in Toms River.
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Joke: The Stingy Bank Loan Officer
The bank President instructs the loan officer in the New York City office, "Listen, these are tough times. We have to eliminate risk from our loan portfolio. So, from now on, only lend money to people who don't need it. And make sure that those are well-secured loans."
The loan officer agrees.
A few minutes later, in walks a famous, fabulously wealthy movie star hunk and his voluptuous female escort. The movie star says, "Listen, I'd like to borrow $15,000."
The loan officer thinks, "WOW! This is unbelievable! A fabulously wealthy borrower, who clearly doesn't need the money!"
So, the loan officer puts on a grim, business-like face and says, "Ahem, I think that we can help you, sir. But, of course we'll need collateral."
The movie star smiles and says, "How about my brand new $1.7 million Burgatti Veyron, which does 0 to 60 in 2.6 seconds, and maxes-out at one-third the speed of sound!"
The loan officer thinks, "Sheesh! The world's most expensive sports car! That's security enough!" But, while he manages to retain his business-like demeanor, he has the movie star sign some papers, he receives his car keys from him, explains that the car will be parked in the bank's secure, insured car lot, and he gives him a bank check for $15,000.
The movie star smiles and says, "Your man will find the car parked in back of the building."
The bank president is shocked at the report of his loan officer's quick success, and writes a memo entitling him to a bonus with the next paycheck.
A week later, the movie star comes back to the loan officer, smiling, a different lovely girl hanging on his arm.
"I'm here to repay my debt," he says. "How much do I owe you?"
Puzzled, the loan officer takes out his calculator, and multiplies $15,000 x .07 interest -:- 52 weeks per year, and says, "That will be the $15,000 we loaned you, plus $20.19."
The movie star gives the loan officer back the bank's own $15,000 check, and a $20 bill and a quarter from his pocket. "Keep the change," he says. "Now, where are my car keys?"
The loan officer is numb with astonishment. "But if you did not even need the $15,000, why did you borrow it?"
The movie star smiles and says, "Where else can I park a $1.7 million car in Manhattan for a week for $20.19?"
The loan officer agrees.
A few minutes later, in walks a famous, fabulously wealthy movie star hunk and his voluptuous female escort. The movie star says, "Listen, I'd like to borrow $15,000."
The loan officer thinks, "WOW! This is unbelievable! A fabulously wealthy borrower, who clearly doesn't need the money!"
So, the loan officer puts on a grim, business-like face and says, "Ahem, I think that we can help you, sir. But, of course we'll need collateral."
The movie star smiles and says, "How about my brand new $1.7 million Burgatti Veyron, which does 0 to 60 in 2.6 seconds, and maxes-out at one-third the speed of sound!"
The loan officer thinks, "Sheesh! The world's most expensive sports car! That's security enough!" But, while he manages to retain his business-like demeanor, he has the movie star sign some papers, he receives his car keys from him, explains that the car will be parked in the bank's secure, insured car lot, and he gives him a bank check for $15,000.
The movie star smiles and says, "Your man will find the car parked in back of the building."
The bank president is shocked at the report of his loan officer's quick success, and writes a memo entitling him to a bonus with the next paycheck.
A week later, the movie star comes back to the loan officer, smiling, a different lovely girl hanging on his arm.
"I'm here to repay my debt," he says. "How much do I owe you?"
Puzzled, the loan officer takes out his calculator, and multiplies $15,000 x .07 interest -:- 52 weeks per year, and says, "That will be the $15,000 we loaned you, plus $20.19."
The movie star gives the loan officer back the bank's own $15,000 check, and a $20 bill and a quarter from his pocket. "Keep the change," he says. "Now, where are my car keys?"
The loan officer is numb with astonishment. "But if you did not even need the $15,000, why did you borrow it?"
The movie star smiles and says, "Where else can I park a $1.7 million car in Manhattan for a week for $20.19?"
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
Where I Am on the Political Spectrum These Days
What has happened to me, philosophically, in the last several years is just amazing. I still regard myself as a broad-minded Christian conservative Republican. But the people around me would probably regard me as a crazy Communist radical if I laid-out my current perspective in all of its glory.
THE JFK ASSASSINATION: JFK was an immoral sex animal. He was a Catholic having sex with every good looking girl he could get his hands on. BUT, I think that a person has to be crazy to believe the single bullet theory. To me, it is clear that the federal intelligence services conspired with members of the Dallas Police Force to do him in.
THE VIETNAM WAR: Did you know that Ho Chi Minh came to us first, but we said, "No"? Oh, my heavens! I supported the Vietnam War, but I have since learned that the North Vietnamese were more conservative than President Nixon! As my son was watching that movie on "Woodstock," recently, I commented to him that the anti-war protesters there would have been shocked and angry at the conservatism of the North Vietnamese -- far, far, far to the right of President Nixon!!! -- and would have preferred President Nixon over the North Vietnamese!!!
How strange!!! How unbelievably strange!!!!
When we warred against North Vietnam, we warred against "mom and apple pie." No joke. We really did.
9/11: I have watched the World Trade Center buildings fall a hundred times. At this point I think that you have to be crazy to believe that a bunch of Arab terrorists were responsible.
Do you know what I think Osama Bin Laden is going to say, if he is captured alive? He is going to say, "What???!!! I did THAT???!!!"
But he will not be captured alive.
At this juncture, I think that 9/11 was about insurance coverage.
CORPORATE BONUSES: This subject makes me crazier than any other. AIG is small potatoes. Forget AIG.
They are ALL writing memos justifying "bonuses." Do you know what those memos say? They say, "I have very cleverly laid-off 150 employees, saving the corporation $15,000,000 this year. GIVE ME A BONUS!!!"
It is really theft from shareholders and employees.
It is evil.
Arrest them, please.
THE JFK ASSASSINATION: JFK was an immoral sex animal. He was a Catholic having sex with every good looking girl he could get his hands on. BUT, I think that a person has to be crazy to believe the single bullet theory. To me, it is clear that the federal intelligence services conspired with members of the Dallas Police Force to do him in.
THE VIETNAM WAR: Did you know that Ho Chi Minh came to us first, but we said, "No"? Oh, my heavens! I supported the Vietnam War, but I have since learned that the North Vietnamese were more conservative than President Nixon! As my son was watching that movie on "Woodstock," recently, I commented to him that the anti-war protesters there would have been shocked and angry at the conservatism of the North Vietnamese -- far, far, far to the right of President Nixon!!! -- and would have preferred President Nixon over the North Vietnamese!!!
How strange!!! How unbelievably strange!!!!
When we warred against North Vietnam, we warred against "mom and apple pie." No joke. We really did.
9/11: I have watched the World Trade Center buildings fall a hundred times. At this point I think that you have to be crazy to believe that a bunch of Arab terrorists were responsible.
Do you know what I think Osama Bin Laden is going to say, if he is captured alive? He is going to say, "What???!!! I did THAT???!!!"
But he will not be captured alive.
At this juncture, I think that 9/11 was about insurance coverage.
CORPORATE BONUSES: This subject makes me crazier than any other. AIG is small potatoes. Forget AIG.
They are ALL writing memos justifying "bonuses." Do you know what those memos say? They say, "I have very cleverly laid-off 150 employees, saving the corporation $15,000,000 this year. GIVE ME A BONUS!!!"
It is really theft from shareholders and employees.
It is evil.
Arrest them, please.
Monday, June 14, 2010
The Case of the Teacher Guilty of Sin
Hypothetical is based on a real case:
Christian woman starts teaching 4th grade in a Christian school in early 2008.
She becomes engaged during the school year.
In January, 2009, she commits the sin of engaging in premarital sex with her future husband, and conceives a child by him.
They marry, as planned, in February, 2009.
In April, 2009, she goes to her principal, a woman, and announces her pregnancy, and requests 6 weeks unpaid maternity leave in the Fall.
During this discussion, the principal is told the probable due date, counts back, and says something like, "Wait -- did you conceive this child before marriage?"
"Yes," the teacher answers.
"You're fired, for immoral conduct," says the principal.
Then, the school notifies other teachers and parents of students that the fourth grade teacher was fired for engaging in the important sin of premarital sex.
The teacher sues the Christian school.
You are on the jury. Would find the school liable? If so, how much would you award as damages?
Christian woman starts teaching 4th grade in a Christian school in early 2008.
She becomes engaged during the school year.
In January, 2009, she commits the sin of engaging in premarital sex with her future husband, and conceives a child by him.
They marry, as planned, in February, 2009.
In April, 2009, she goes to her principal, a woman, and announces her pregnancy, and requests 6 weeks unpaid maternity leave in the Fall.
During this discussion, the principal is told the probable due date, counts back, and says something like, "Wait -- did you conceive this child before marriage?"
"Yes," the teacher answers.
"You're fired, for immoral conduct," says the principal.
Then, the school notifies other teachers and parents of students that the fourth grade teacher was fired for engaging in the important sin of premarital sex.
The teacher sues the Christian school.
You are on the jury. Would find the school liable? If so, how much would you award as damages?
Saturday, June 12, 2010
Kids on the High Seas
Forgive me for not publishing for awhile. Responsibilities win. Avocational endeavors lose.
The dismasting of 16 year old solo sailor Abby Sunderland's boat in the Indian Ocean this week, so that she was mistakenly feared lost by observers around the world, generated a flurry of nasty criticism of the parents by people around the world -- should responsible parents be allowing their teenagers to do such things?
When Robin Lee Graham began his famous solo voyage around the world in 1965, it was still a "National Geographic world" where costumed folk of marvelous lands opened their arms appreciatively to travelers from the West, in the warm afterglow of World War II.
No longer. By and large, the world is filled with hatred and coveting, terrorists and crime. They want to seize us, cook us and eat us for dinner, I think. It really is much changed.
Those social dangers are in addition to the dangers in an environment afflicted with global warming, where the average weather-bearing vortex is 50% larger and more powerful than they used to be, only a few decades ago. The seas are more dangerous than ever, as a consequence.
It sounds like I'm about to condemn Abby Sunderland's parents, right?
Wrong.
As our kids grew up, changes in our society forced me to amend Birds and the Bees discussions with them to include advice respecting extraordinary care even about kissing -- even polite let-me-get-to-know-you kissing -- of all things. Since the 1960s, growth hormone in our meats and unmetabolized birth control pill chemicals spread everywhere in the environment have pushed kids' bodies into puberty years and years earlier. Kids have begun having sex and bearing babies earlier than ever. Kids are contracting venereal diseases earlier than ever -- including the viral kind, for which there is no cure. Finally, kids are now customarily substituting head jobs for venereal sex to avoid pregnancy -- transfering virus-generated venereal disease, and the accompanying warts and sores from the crotches of infected children to their mouths. Thus my Birds and the Bees advice on care even about kissing.
Kissing has become a life-threatening enterprise, with possible devastating lifelong, life-threatening consequences.
So, here is my simple question for readers here: Who is safer? Abby Sunderland, alone on a sailboat in the middle of the wild Indian Ocean?
Or one of our kids on a date?
Surprisingly, it's a difficult question.
Sail on, Abby. Be careful, little honey, but sail on, sail on.
The dismasting of 16 year old solo sailor Abby Sunderland's boat in the Indian Ocean this week, so that she was mistakenly feared lost by observers around the world, generated a flurry of nasty criticism of the parents by people around the world -- should responsible parents be allowing their teenagers to do such things?
When Robin Lee Graham began his famous solo voyage around the world in 1965, it was still a "National Geographic world" where costumed folk of marvelous lands opened their arms appreciatively to travelers from the West, in the warm afterglow of World War II.
No longer. By and large, the world is filled with hatred and coveting, terrorists and crime. They want to seize us, cook us and eat us for dinner, I think. It really is much changed.
Those social dangers are in addition to the dangers in an environment afflicted with global warming, where the average weather-bearing vortex is 50% larger and more powerful than they used to be, only a few decades ago. The seas are more dangerous than ever, as a consequence.
It sounds like I'm about to condemn Abby Sunderland's parents, right?
Wrong.
As our kids grew up, changes in our society forced me to amend Birds and the Bees discussions with them to include advice respecting extraordinary care even about kissing -- even polite let-me-get-to-know-you kissing -- of all things. Since the 1960s, growth hormone in our meats and unmetabolized birth control pill chemicals spread everywhere in the environment have pushed kids' bodies into puberty years and years earlier. Kids have begun having sex and bearing babies earlier than ever. Kids are contracting venereal diseases earlier than ever -- including the viral kind, for which there is no cure. Finally, kids are now customarily substituting head jobs for venereal sex to avoid pregnancy -- transfering virus-generated venereal disease, and the accompanying warts and sores from the crotches of infected children to their mouths. Thus my Birds and the Bees advice on care even about kissing.
Kissing has become a life-threatening enterprise, with possible devastating lifelong, life-threatening consequences.
So, here is my simple question for readers here: Who is safer? Abby Sunderland, alone on a sailboat in the middle of the wild Indian Ocean?
Or one of our kids on a date?
Surprisingly, it's a difficult question.
Sail on, Abby. Be careful, little honey, but sail on, sail on.
Monday, May 31, 2010
The Simpler Solution to Putting a Cork on the Gulf Oil Spill
A great big SOCK.
Cut off the pipe to the well head.
Put a collar on it, to make sure that jagged edges can't tear.
Wrap the mud hose in a huge, long sock.
Jam it down the well.
Fill the sock with mud.
Cut off the pipe to the well head.
Put a collar on it, to make sure that jagged edges can't tear.
Wrap the mud hose in a huge, long sock.
Jam it down the well.
Fill the sock with mud.
Friday, May 7, 2010
The Strange Case of Morgellons Disease
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Science has enabled tiny things to do amazing jobs. For example, in the article on the Thousand Year Certificates of Deposit, I calculated the ultimate value of a $1,000 1,000 year CD with 3% interest compounded annually by multiplying $1,000 x (1.03 to the 999th power). I did it with a 3" x 6" x .75" Casio fx-115s Scientific Calculator with a wonderful "X to the Y Power" function and scientific notation yielding results in powers of 10.
That is amazing, isn't it?
But such technology really does have its "dark side."
We really have reached the point where we have bug-sized flying spy machines, like the Scarab in Raymond Z. Gallun's 1936 short story of the same name, able to enter terrorist hideouts -- and homes -- and spy upon events there.
And, we have arrived at the Era of the Nanites.
Nanites -- robots the size of large molecules or somewhat larger, have already entered the stream of commerce around us. There are problems with robot theory. For example, what is referred to as Brownian Motion -- natural molecular vibration -- already places a limit on robot size. If a nanite were to be too small, it would shake too much to be useful. (Theoretically, if a nanite were made to be too small and too simple, it might become an uncollapsed, invisible quantum probability cloud!) But, for example, we already have windows covered with nanites engaged in keeping the windows clean!
Physicians are afraid of nanotechnology, in another way: If self-replicating nanites were to enter a human body, would the body's immune system recognize them as a non-organic threat? Or, instead, would it sit by, idle and stupid, while nanites designed to enter and attach to human bodies and replicate and further infect human bodies until an infected person's body turns into a pile of nanite garbage, do their work and kill a nanite-infected victim?
Which brings us to an amazing topic -- Morgellons Disease.
Several years ago, a really odd item hit the news: People in certain locales were developing a medical condition caused by no identifiable germ in which they would suffer from persistent skin lesions, red, white and blue body hair, and a persistent, utterly maddening sensation of bugs crawling under their skin, biting and stinging them.
Some derisively referred to the disease as "delusional parasitosis." In other words, "The people complaining about this alleged disease are simply nuts."
But, today, the web is full of photos of the skin lesions and accompanying bizarre red, white and blue hairs.
And, to this day, no one has found a microorganism which can be blamed for the condition.
The strange sickness generated its own urban-legend-level explanation: Morgellons Diease is a biological warfare experiment by an intelligence agency contractor using nanites. The utterly-disabling lesions and maddening sensation of bugs crawling, stinging and biting under the skin, intended to disable soldiers of invading armies, are caused by molecule-sized robotic entities released into the atmosphere by Air Force planes flying over locales where the disease has appeared. The red, white and blue body hairs caused by the disease are intended as a joke taunting the enemy with a the concept, "Uncle Sam did this to you."
Is the urban legend analysis wrong?
I don't know. Those red, white and blue hairs are awfully strange!
.
Science has enabled tiny things to do amazing jobs. For example, in the article on the Thousand Year Certificates of Deposit, I calculated the ultimate value of a $1,000 1,000 year CD with 3% interest compounded annually by multiplying $1,000 x (1.03 to the 999th power). I did it with a 3" x 6" x .75" Casio fx-115s Scientific Calculator with a wonderful "X to the Y Power" function and scientific notation yielding results in powers of 10.
That is amazing, isn't it?
But such technology really does have its "dark side."
We really have reached the point where we have bug-sized flying spy machines, like the Scarab in Raymond Z. Gallun's 1936 short story of the same name, able to enter terrorist hideouts -- and homes -- and spy upon events there.
And, we have arrived at the Era of the Nanites.
Nanites -- robots the size of large molecules or somewhat larger, have already entered the stream of commerce around us. There are problems with robot theory. For example, what is referred to as Brownian Motion -- natural molecular vibration -- already places a limit on robot size. If a nanite were to be too small, it would shake too much to be useful. (Theoretically, if a nanite were made to be too small and too simple, it might become an uncollapsed, invisible quantum probability cloud!) But, for example, we already have windows covered with nanites engaged in keeping the windows clean!
Physicians are afraid of nanotechnology, in another way: If self-replicating nanites were to enter a human body, would the body's immune system recognize them as a non-organic threat? Or, instead, would it sit by, idle and stupid, while nanites designed to enter and attach to human bodies and replicate and further infect human bodies until an infected person's body turns into a pile of nanite garbage, do their work and kill a nanite-infected victim?
Which brings us to an amazing topic -- Morgellons Disease.
Several years ago, a really odd item hit the news: People in certain locales were developing a medical condition caused by no identifiable germ in which they would suffer from persistent skin lesions, red, white and blue body hair, and a persistent, utterly maddening sensation of bugs crawling under their skin, biting and stinging them.
Some derisively referred to the disease as "delusional parasitosis." In other words, "The people complaining about this alleged disease are simply nuts."
But, today, the web is full of photos of the skin lesions and accompanying bizarre red, white and blue hairs.
And, to this day, no one has found a microorganism which can be blamed for the condition.
The strange sickness generated its own urban-legend-level explanation: Morgellons Diease is a biological warfare experiment by an intelligence agency contractor using nanites. The utterly-disabling lesions and maddening sensation of bugs crawling, stinging and biting under the skin, intended to disable soldiers of invading armies, are caused by molecule-sized robotic entities released into the atmosphere by Air Force planes flying over locales where the disease has appeared. The red, white and blue body hairs caused by the disease are intended as a joke taunting the enemy with a the concept, "Uncle Sam did this to you."
Is the urban legend analysis wrong?
I don't know. Those red, white and blue hairs are awfully strange!
.
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